Emile Durkheim and Max Weber Essay

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Vushaj
SOC 150-05
September 6, 2013
Writing assignment #1
Sociology is the study of society and social interaction. Sociology takes a broad approach at helping one understand how people interact in different societies. On the contrary, other social sciences look deeper into specific areas of society, rather than society as a whole. Classical sociologists Karl Marx, Emile Durkheim and Max Weber, each contributed to the scientific study of sociology. Marx believed that societies grew and changed due to struggles of different social classes. Durkheim believed in studying the “social facts,” which would help determine if a society was healthy or pathological. Weber’s focus on the structure of society included the elements of class, status and power. Each sociologist had a great influence in the field of sociology, but took different approaches to studying societies.
Sociology enables us to understand how society functions and under which circumstances. It examines the way humans interact with social changes and with other societies. Additionally, sociology focuses on examining social dynamics such as culture, values, socialization, violence, inequality and order. Other social sciences concentrate on more specific things about a society. Instead of studying social economics as a whole, other social sciences may study about the distribution of economic goods and how it affects an individual. In other words, a sociologist emphasizes social behavior, but a psychologist will focus more on individual behavior.
Karl Marx believed that economics was the underlying key to understanding human society. His idea was that social conflict leads to change in society. Conflict resulted from the struggles of different social classes over the means of production. Social classes are an example of his theory of alienation. Alienation is a separation process. It describes what happens when one loses control over their behavior. For example, a worker loses control of the value...